Below are descriptions of the program's required core courses. Additional information can be found at these sources:
UCSC General Catalog — the complete list of DANM courses
UCSC Schedule of Classes — for a specific offering of any course, including scheduling information
DANM 201. Recent Methods and Approaches to Digital Arts and Culture. F
Students examine methods and approaches to research and writing in
digital art and new media, while exploring key theories concerning
technology, art, and culture. Focus is on the interaction between
digital technologies and socio/cultural formations. Enrollment
restricted to graduate students. S. Murray
DANM 202. Dialogues and Questions in Digital Arts and Culture. S
Students engage in dialogues at the intersection of theory and practice
with the goal of producing a pre-thesis proposal and essay. Readings
and seminar discussions inform the development of project proposals and
essays, which theoretically contextualize students' work. (Formerly
Digital Arts and New Media 203.) (Also offered as Music 254Q. Students
cannot receive credit for both courses.) Enrollment restricted to
graduate students. B. Carson
DANM 203. Frameworks and Arguments in Digital Arts and Culture. S
Intended to help students develop and write the MFA thesis. Students
conduct research on the thesis topic, design outlines, construct strong
theoretical arguments, and draft the final document. (Formerly course
202, Genealogies and Theories of Digital Arts and Culture.) M. Morse
DANM 210. Project Design Studio. F
Students work on the design of individual projects by developing
project proposals, budgets, "proof of concept" design documents and/or
prototypes and exploring tools, technologies, programming languages,
hardware, software, and electronics techniques relevant to their
projects. Enrollment restricted to graduate students. E. Crichton
DANM 211. Critique. S
First-year digital arts and new media graduate students are required to
present work-in-progress based on the projects developed in earlier
courses and during the current quarter in individual studio critiques
with the instructor as well as in group critiques. Enrollment
restricted to graduate students. Enrollment limited to 18. S. Daniel
DANM 212. Thesis Proposal (no credit). S
First-year digital art and new media graduate students work on the
development and completion of their thesis-project proposal and
abstract under the supervision of the program chair and their thesis
committees. Enrollment restricted to DANM students. The Staff
DANM 215. MFA Exhibition Production. W
Second-year digital arts and new media graduate students work with
faculty curator/coordinator to develop thesis projects specifically for
the group exhibition context. Students contribute to exhibition design
and collateral materials while studying the unique presentation and
curatorial challenges of new media. Enrollment restricted to graduate
students. S. Murray
DANM 219. Introduction to Electronics for Artmaking. F
Intensive introduction to electronic devices used in artmaking,
providing hands-on experience with sensors, motors, switches, gears,
lights, simple circuits, microprocessors, and hardware storage devices
to create kinetic and interactive works of art. Students are billed a
materials fee. Enrollment restricted to graduate students. The Staff
DANM 220. Introduction to Programming for the Arts. W
Covers aspects of computer programming necessary for digital art
projects. Students learn to manipulate digital media using program
control for installations, presentations, and the Internet. No prior
programming experience required. Enrollment restricted to graduate
students. P. Elsea
Graduate-level advanced seminar explores ways that seeing, hearing,and knowing are influenced by culture, power, race, and other factors. Readings emphasize how documentary subjects are constituted and known, addressing questions of epistemology, social constructivism, objectivity, and method. (Also offered as Social Documentation 204. Students cannot receive credit for both courses.) Enrollment restricted to social documentation and digital arts new media graduate students. M. Ochoa
DANM 205. Approaches to Social Documentation. F
Comprehensive review and analysis of documentary strategies aimed at
societal critique and social change, evaluating changes in argument,
evidence, and process over development of the discipline. (Also offered
as Social Documentation 200. Students cannot receive credit for both
courses.) A concurrent media lab is required. Enrollment restricted to
digital arts and new media graduate students. Enrollment limited to 15.
B. Rich
DANM 206. Practice of Social Documentary. F
Introduction to social documentary genres including video, photography,
new media and other mediums, which addresses social-scientific research and methodology in the context of these processes. (Also offered as Social Documentation 202. Students cannot receive credit for both courses.) A concurrent media lab is required. Enrollment restricted to
digital arts and new media graduate students. Enrollment limited to 15.
J. Leanos
DANM 207. Video Production of the Social Documentary. W
Intensive directing and producing course that covers conceptualization,
research, treatment and proposal writing, interview technique, camera,
editing, production, and distribution. (Also offered as Social
Documentation 280. Students cannot receive credit for both courses.) A
concurrent media lab is required. Enrollment restricted to digital arts
and new media graduate students. Enrollment limited to 15. S.L. Chiang
DANM 208. Special Topics in Social Documentation. F,W,S
Designed to provide supplemental instruction on specific topical and/or
technical matters related to social documentation. Topics include
technical standards and innovations within the field of social
documentation, documentary subjects, location production, and/or the
work of individual professional documentarians. (Also offered as Social
Documentation 290. Students cannot receive credit for both courses.)
Enrollment restricted to digital arts and new media graduate students.
Enrollment limited to 15. May be repeated for credit. The Staff
DANM 216. Digital Bodies. *
Explores the appearance, form, and theoretical status of the human
body/political subject in online art. Focuses on representations of
race and gender, family resemblances, and local communities, as well as
the political and colonial metaphors of spatial interaction operating
on the World Wide Web. Visual representations of bodies that take the
form of avatars, advertising, robots, and anime studied in their
contextual usage. Enrollment restricted to graduate students.
Upper-division undergraduates may enroll with permission of instructor.
Enrollment limited to 17. J. Gonzalez
DANM 221. Mathematics and the Arts. *
Examines the role of mathematics in the arts since the computer
revolution with an emphasis on chaos, fractals, and symmetry. Covers
abstract animation and algorithmic music, including the history of
leading innovators and techniques from 1950 to the present. Student
projects explore the creative process today using cutting-edge
technologies. Enrollment restricted to graduate students.
Upper-division undergraduates may enroll with permission of instructor.
Enrollment limited to 30. May be repeated for credit. R. Abraham
DANM 224. Digital Arts Project Studio. *
Provides a context for significant development of digital arts
projects: in the first year, individual and collaborative; in the
second year, resolution of thesis projects. Individuals and
collaborative groups meet with the instructor for focused critical
feedback. Students create a public exhibition of their
work-in-progress. Enrollment restricted to graduate students.
Enrollment limited to 18. E. Crichton
DANM 227. Projected Light in Performance. W
Exploration of projected light in performance and art. The history of
lighting as art is covered in a hands-on demystifying format from the
shadow of a bare light bulb to the latest in automated and projection
equipment and techniques. Enrollment restricted to graduate students.
Juniors and seniors may enroll with permission of instructor.
Enrollment limited to 20. D. Cuthbert
DANM 228. Techniques of Modernity and Aesthetic Formations. *
Explores the transformations and aesthetic possibilities of the digital
age through a study of perceptual shifts of the past, from orality to
literacy, gift to commodity, pre-colonial to colonial, "pre-modern" to
"modern," and the technological revolutions that accompanied these
shifts. (Also offered as Music 228. Students cannot receive credit for
both courses.) Enrollment restricted to graduate students;
upper-division undergraduates may enroll with permission of instructor.
Enrollment limited to 18. D. Neuman
DANM 231. Human-Computer Interaction. W
Theory and hands-on practice to understand what makes user interfaces
usable and accessible to diverse individuals. Covers human senses and
memory and their design implications, requirement solicitation,
user-centered design and prototyping techniques, and expert and user
evaluations. Individual research project. Interdisciplinary course for
art, social science and engineering graduate students. Students cannot
receive credit for this course and course 131. (Also offered as
Computer Engineering 231. Students cannot receive credit for both
courses.) Enrollment restricted to graduate students. S. Kurniawan
DANM 233. The Object as Interface. *
Combination theory and studio-based exploration into the role of the
object in real and virtual space. Provides a broad conceptual and
theoretical examination of issues relating to object-making on a
physical and dematerialized plane. Enrollment restricted to graduate
students. Enrollment limited to 15. W. Hibbert-Jones
DANM 254I. Empirical Approaches to Art Information. *
Reading and practice in empirical methods, as applied to the study of
music, visual art, multimedia production, and performance arts. Topics
include semiotics, critiques of empiricism, cultural determinants and
contingents of perception, the psychophysics of information, sensory
perception (visual and auditory), memory, pattern recognition, and
awareness. Students apply existing knowledge in the cognitive sciences
to a developing creative project, or develop and conduct new
experiments. (Also offered as Music 254I. Students cannot receive
credit for both courses.) Enrollment restricted to graduate students.
Enrollment limited to 17. May be repeated for credit. B. Carson